GLOBETROTTING O
Casual Orienteering in the American North West Matthew King – Bayside Kangaroos
My daughter went to Lulea in the north of Sweden (near the Arctic Circle) on a student exchange in 2008. So, of course, my wife and I had to visit her. Unfortunately, I never got a chance to do any Orienteering in Sweden, but we returned via Canada, Alaska and Seattle and I managed to participate in three events, two in Vancouver and one in Seattle.
I hit the swamp. Forests in Vancouver are either quite dense underneath or swampy but relatively clear of undergrowth. The swampy areas consist of little islands of earth covered in trees and it is a challenge to find your way from island to island. One of the swamp controls was quite difficult to find but I had the satisfaction of seeing a number of locals also struggling to find the control. The third event was two weeks later; it was the Gig Harbour Street Scramble. The event was held on a Saturday morning at Gig Harbour near Tacoma about an hour’s drive south of Seattle. It was very much like a Melbourne
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HE first event was on a Wednesday evening in Vancouver, held in Ambleside Park, just north of the Lion’s Gate Bridge joining North and South Vancouver. The instructions were to meet beside the kiosk in the park for a 7pm start. At 6:30 I turned up – no-one around. I wandered around looking for Orienteering flags but found none. At about 7pm I found a number of people by the kiosk - this was it. We wrote our names on a sheet of paper and the “starter” let us go at about 30sec intervals in the order our names were written down. There was one course with the option to finish early by missing a number of controls after passing the Finish the first time. The park had some quite dense vegetation and several of the controls were quite difficult to locate. Some interesting aspects of the event were - the controls were little red flags about 20cm high which you needed to touch before moving to the next control; there were no control cards, just the honour system; there was a control in front of a “homeless people’s doss” in the forest; and, you were not disqualified for climbing the 2metre fence to cross the railway line (Melbourne metro evening Orienteers understand this comment)!
At Gig Harbour there were tents set up by sponsors: health companies taking blood pressure; the police, fire brigade and even the local aquarium had exhibits.
The second event was the following Sunday - a club type event. This was held at Rice Lake in North East Vancouver in a beautiful pine forest. It was also National Orienteering Week in Canada and there were quite a lot of beginners attending to try out Orienteering. This event had a 10am start and an option of three (short, medium and long) courses with Sportident. I chose the medium course because I had limited time and was unfamiliar with the terrain. First control was a rock on top of a small hill – well I found the hill but where was the rock? First lesson - rocks in Vancouver are green and blend in with the vegetation because they are covered in moss! I was doing OK (the locals thought the course and map were quite technical) until 24 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER JUNE 2009
Ambleside Park Scale: 1: 5 000
Map printed here at 75%
